both low and high, rich and poor alike.
Parallel translations
- WEB both low and high, rich and poor together.
- KJV Both low and high, rich and poor, together.
- NKJV Both low and high, Rich and poor together.
- NASB Both low and high, Rich and poor together.
- NLT High and low, rich and poor—listen!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Both the lowly and the great, rich and poor alike, are addressed. Death and the need for redemption level all distinctions.
Overview
The psalmist explicitly includes every social class because his message about wealth and mortality confronts all alike. The rich are warned not to trust their money, and the poor are comforted that worldly status is fleeting. This anticipates the gospel truth that all stand equal before God, equally needing the redemption He alone provides.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Ps 62:9Lowborn men are but a vapor, the exalted but a lie. Weighed on the scale, they go up; together they are but a vapor.
- Jas 2:1–7My brothers, as you hold out your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, do not show favoritism.
- Prov 22:2The rich and the poor have this in common: The LORD is Maker of them all.
- 1 Sam 2:7–8The LORD sends poverty and wealth; He humbles and He exalts.
- Job 34:19who is not partial to princes and does not favor rich over poor? For they are all the work of His hands.
- Jer 5:4–5Then I said, “They are only the poor; they have played the fool, for they do not know the way of the LORD, the justice of their God.
- Rev 6:15–17Then the kings of the earth, the nobles, the commanders, the rich, the mighty, and every slave and free man hid in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains.
- Jas 1:9–11The brother in humble circumstances should exult in his high position.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 49:2 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.